


bearing a loss

by Saraste



Series: A month of nwalin [3]
Category: The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: (kind of), Angst, Battle of Five Armies Fix-It, Dwarf Culture & Customs, Emotional hurt with no comfort, M/M, Post-Battle of Five Armies, Ri Family Feels, spymaster nori
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-03
Updated: 2017-01-03
Packaged: 2018-09-14 13:39:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 395
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9183940
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Saraste/pseuds/Saraste
Summary: Nori has lost what he sometimes thinks he never maybe even had anyway.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Any resemblance to a very angsty fic as written by katajainen entirely unintentional.

Nori might envy Ori his happiness but he would never deny him it. He's used to disappointment,  _ is a disappointment  _ as Dori so fondly used to remind him _ ,  _ better that it's him. That it's him bearing the loss.

 

And Ori looks so ridiculously happy with the two besotted princes, battle-scarred but living, bearing Ori’s braids, Ori almost flaunting theirs, if such a thing can be said of Nori’s younger sibling, that Nori can't fault him. 

 

Nori’s braids are those of a craft-wed dwarrow, one committed only to the love of skill, not interested in the love of a heart, the heat of a body. His craft is that of knowing what needs to be known, finding out what others strive to hide, uncovering any plot that might undermine the peace and prosperity of Erebor, to threaten the line of Durin, whose lives had been so dearly bought in battle before it's very gates.

 

None knows that better than Nori.

 

Dori, who has always been craft-wed, questioned Nori’s new braids, at first. ‘ You  _ are _ entitled to a widow's braids,’ he’d said, and Nori had tried hard not to cry. ‘ I ain't, am I, and everyone knows it.’ His fussy older brother had said something about being wed in the eyes of their Maker, but had stopped by whatever horror he saw on Nori’s face. Had held him when the tears came.

 

Now they share tea at least once a week, Dori used to Nori’s silences, Nori not deciphering all his brother does not say from his lengthy silences. They often talk of Ori and his happiness, even when that pains Nori, but his love for Ori overcomes even such pains. Nori might not be happy, never will be, truly, but contentedness suffices. 

 

The Halls of the Dead are cool and quiet, calm, when Nori visits. Rarely, but often enough. Carved stone, runes, are what he has now, everything he has left of the warrior who saved others without regard for his own life… or Nori.

 

Nori has to think that Dwalin hadn't intended to die, that he had thought more of him, that he would have braided Nori, shared his heart with him. Loved him through all the days Mahal would have granted to them.  _ Had loved him _ . Nori has to believe that.

 

For if Nori doesn't, his heart might break. 

 

...what's left of it, anyway. 


End file.
